Florida Gators

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Todd Golden really likes his transfer-portal acquisitions. Micah Handlogten is set to take a medical red-shirt year. And there's still a wait-and-see element with his 2024-25 Florida basketball squad.
 
Those were the big takeaways from Golden's media opportunity Friday, the Florida head coach's first since the Gators' heart-breaking, season-ending, last-second loss to Colorado in the NCAA Tournament on March 22. 
 
"I think we've gotten better," Golden said. 
 
That should be of encouragement to UF fans who watched the Gators go 24-12, set a program record by scoring 85.6 points a game, play for their first Southeastern Conference championship in a decade and return to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in three years. Eventually, the season closed with a pulsating 102-100 defeat against the Buffaloes, a game UF trailed by 13 with just over four minutes to go, only to have its remarkable comeback thwarted when CU hit the decisive shot with 1.8 seconds remaining. 
 
The loss marked the final collegiate games for a pair of impact grad-transfers in point guard Zyon Pullin and forward Tyrese Samuel, both of whom garnered All-SEC honors. Shortly thereafter sophomore guard Riley Kugel, a top backup, and sophomore forward Aleks Szymczyk, who sat out the season recovering from a broken foot, entered the transfer portal, while a pair of starters in guard Walter Clayton Jr. and wing Will Richard headed into the NBA evaluation process while retaining their eligibility and option to return to the Gators. 
 
Golden and his staff are optimistic both Clayton, the team's scoring leader at 17.6 points per game, and Richard, 10.9 points in his two seasons as a starter, will be back. With that in mind, the Gators commenced to rebuild around those two, plus standout freshman forwards Alex Condon and Tommy Haugh, plus backup sophomore guard Denzel Aberdeen, who's expected to assume a much bigger role in the rotation after shining in the postseason. In a perfect world, Handlogten would have been part of that returning nucleus, but the severity of his injury – and the possibility of his recovery going deep into next season – prompted the 7-foot-1 center, who averaged 5.3 points and 6.9 rebounds 32 starts, to be encouraged to take his time coming back, work on his skills, get stronger and be full go for '25-26 (with two years of eligibility left). Handlogten was cool with the plan.
 
"It would be best for him to know that he doesn't feel pressured to get back quick, which we didn't want him to feel anyway," Golden said. "When we had that conversation, it was great. It provided clarity for him."
 
As well as for the staff, which proceeded to pluck Tennessee-Chattanooga 6-9 forward Sam Alexis and 6-11 center/forward Rueben Chenyelu to slide into the Samuel and Handlogten spots. Then came guard Aliyah Martin, one of the key players on 2023 Florida Atlantic's Final Four squad, into the mix, presumably to replace Pullin's minutes, though in a very different role. 
 
Alexis averaged 10.8 points, 9.1 rebounds and 2.1 blocks per game, while shooting nearly 61 percent from the 2-point area. He also ranked in the top 50 nationally in defensive rebounding and top 100 on the offensive end. Chenyelu, with his 7-8 wing span, was a backup at WSU, where he scored 4.7 points on nearly 62 percent from the floor (with zero 3-point attempts) to go with 5.0 rebounds and 1.3 blocks on just 13.9 minutes over 35 games. Only four times did Chinyelu play at least 20 minutes and in those games he averaged 7.0 points, 10.0 rebounds and 2.0 blocks. 
 
Golden on Alexis: "A really good rim-protector. We feel he's got room to just keep getting better. He's only 19. Really young, but strong, big body. It'll be a great summer for him here and we think he'll be really impactful next year."
 
And about Chinyelu: "When you look at his counting stats from last year they don't really jump out, but if you dig into his numbers and see that he was over 60 percent from the field, a great rim protector, incredible size, we feel like he's going to take a huge jump going into next season."
 
Then comes Martin. He amassed nearly 1,500 points at FAU and averaged close to 14 points in starting each of the last three seasons as a high-usage perimeter player at a program that combined to go 60-13 over the last two years. Martin scored 26 points in the Owls' Final Four loss to San Diego State in 2023.
 
Martin isn't coming here to run the offense, but to be another threat in it. 
 
"What's important for him is just to get more of an opportunity to play on the ball. That doesn't necessarily mean he's going to be the main point guard, but we are confident in his ability to play out of the ball screen a little more," Golden said. "At FAU last year – and they were very good, obviously – he was more of an off-ball and spacer, but we want to give him more of an opportunity to get downhill in our ball-screen action and make more plays for himself and others. It's just kind of the natural progression of his career. For him, to be an impact player at the next level, he has to be able to prove he can do that."  None of Florida's incoming players solves the void for a true point guard. Aberdeen, although unproven as a full-time option there, is probably the closest thing. That may ultimately mean a lot of in-the-gym, one-on-one work for Clayton, Richard, Martin and Aberdeen (plus, rising sophomore Kajus Kublickas, who played just 36 minutes over nine games as a freshman) with assistant coach and director of player development Taurean Green, honing in on specific skills relative to attacking pressure defense. 

Even with Pullin last season, Florida's execution against pressure – especially, full-court pressure – was not great. 
 
"Yeah, we're going to be different," Golden allowed. "I'm counting on their experience and their talent to take over and be able to manage that."

And he's counting on the coaching staff, collectively, to come up with an offseason plan to address a defense – the one that gave up 102 points and allowed Colorado to shoot 61 percent, including 11 straight second-half makes in the tournament – that finished 94^th in the country (compared to 12^th on offense) and was one of the nation's worst at forcing turnovers.

Both Alexis and Chinyelu, combined with the high-energy and elite defensive play of Condon and Haugh, should make for an upgrade on the back end. Martin will help on the perimeter, but Clayton, Richard and the rest need to collectively make a jump, also, especially in their on-ball defense.

"We were above average nationally, defensively, but below average for a tournament team," Golden said. "If we can go from 93^rd defensively to top 50 next year, we're going to be pretty good, so that's where I'm focused. I need to do a better job of emphasizing it and coaching iot, but again, it was a little tricky last year when we were scoring all those points to spend time on the defensive end. We'll do that this summer, for sure."
 
With two scholarships still vacant, and Clayton and Richard (for the time being) still in NBA eval limbo, there will be more work to do this summer, for sure.